Life-Size Buzz and Neil (enlarged 1/4 Ken West "Apollo Astronauts on the Moon")

[rifleman]

and he's back great to see you building again also seeing your builds

[Philip]

The ingenuity of some folks here often amazes me.

[Algebraist]

Originally Posted by rifleman

and he's back great to see you building again also seeing your builds

It is very good to be back and continuing this build (hopefully to the finish) and great to hear from you rifleman.

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Originally Posted by Philip

The ingenuity of some folks here often amazes me.

For me it is often panic/desperation! Still it is very nice when you find a way round an issue that gives a good result.

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Dear all

The next part of the helmet to construct is the bit that goes from the "round head" to the shoulders. Yet more very long parts



As you can see the actual part is spread over 3 pieces of A3 paper. The next section is an odd looking part that has "holes" in it



Basically in the actual Apollo astronaut helmet, the "pressurized" part was made of "plastic" and the white outer layer we could see was a fabric shroud/hood that went over it and draped over the shoulders. This covering "rucked up" around the neck area and this part of the model is some built in rucking. So inserted into the "holes" are these parts which make the rucks



These parts (which look a bit like lips to me) are difficult to join since they go to a point and also need to attach to the main body of the helmet. Moreover they need to curve just right to fit the appropriate hole (assuming that is curved just right)



As you can see my concerns were well grounded and the result is not great. I need to do a certain amount of surgery



But even doing that does not cure all the problems. A real issue is the number of tabs overlaid in one place is just not letting the paper take the correct shape. This is also compounded with same error upon small error of curve fitting in all three directions



So the finished result is not great. The only saving grace is that this part of the suit is supposed to be clearly fabric with rucks so I may just be able to get away with it. However I am starting to get very nervous of the visor area as really this nears to be a close to perfect to the eye.

Here is a final photo of the state of things so far illuminated from the inside to highlight the tabs



Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Dear all

It is now time to do the "interface" between the body of the helmet and the visor. In the instructions for the original 1/4 scale model, you some edging parts going around the "hole" where the visor will go and then a single part that goes across the hole (as shown below)



So I start with the edging parts of the top rim and two sides



When I did the 1/4 scale helmets I fitted a brace across the width of the helmet to help ensure all the angles of the helmet were as they were supposed to be



This meant that when the "backing plate" which fills the hole of the front of the helmet, to which the visor is glued, will be more likely to be at all the correct angles (to accept the visor). And it worked ok (I think)



However in the 1/4 model, you make the visor, glue all round the edge and push and hold the visor in place onto the backing plate in one go. There is no way this is possible (for me) in the life size case. It is just too big. As fer as I can tell I will have to "get inside" the helmet (so to speak) in order to glue the visor to the helmet a bit at a time.

So I made the face plate (which has to be two parts) and then mark out where I think the visor will make contact (by referencing the 1/4 model I have made) and then working out how big I can cut some "access holes" in the face plate



Everything seems very wobbly. There is no solid reference in the helmet at this scale and I do feel quite nervous with all the accuracy required to make all the curve fitting work and the visor then to fit properly. So I have decided to to make a solid totally stiff brace across the width of the face plate and hope everything can be successfully built from that. We shall see.

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Dear all

It was now time to make the "backing/face plate" and attach it to the body of the helmet. So first the to parts of the face plate were joined



and then the side joining parts were attached to the face plate



Now for the stiffening frame. I decided to strengthen the rectangle across the middle of the face plate using a combination of a rectangular template made from 3mm thick card and adding addition strengthening struts. Here is the cut out template



My hands have deteriorated to the extent that I am unable to to cut card with a scalpel/knife/blade. Fortunately I have the wolf cardboard cutter which you can see in the picture. It is an incredible tool which I have used before on this model. Here are the struts in manufacture which are strips of 3mm card glued to together and compressed using clips



Next is positioning the rectangular template (which needs to be accurate)



Followed by the addition of the strengthening struts using paper joiners



The central rectangle of the face plate is extremely stiff and the two semi circles above and below are still very flexible. Next to join the face plate to the body of the helmet. So Buzz first. This turns out to be harder than I expected due to constricted space and being able to see what is going on. Getting this glued "untwisted" is crucial (even a little bit out will make proper visor joining impossible, and holding the large wobbly helmet whilst trying to glue the start of the first side of the face plate is stressful/challenging to say the least! However managed it



Next I decide to add the top rim of the helmet to the body of the helmet. This start to go downhill here. It is sometimes hard getting into the correct position to glue with the face plate now in place, even with all the access holes I have cut. It also does not seem to be fitting. I even have to do surgery to try and get a fit



As you can see, despite my efforts it is a really rubbish join. All these possible errors are now coming home to roost. So I "join" the top part of the face plate to the helmet.



As you can see it is a disaster!. The face plate needs to be perfectly flat and that top curve of where it joins the helmet needs to be super smooth. There is no way the visor can possible join the helmet in this state. I need to go and have a think about what to do to try and rescue the situation.

Regards

Kevin

[Algebraist]

Dear all

Given the state of Buzz's helmet I decided it best to stop work on that and try a different approach on Neil's helmet. I reasoned/hoped that the main flaw was due to the poor join of the rim part joining the main body of the helmet. So for Neil's helmet I decided to join that part to the face plate first, that way ensuring a good join



As you can see above this certainly was an improvement to Buzz's helmet. Next to ensure that the upper semicircle of the face plate was in the same plane and to minimize possible deviation from the correct join of the rim to the helmet body (since these areas were where I thought the other major problems with Buzz's helmet arose from, I attached a card stiffening template for the upper part of the face plate. It was 1mm thick card to allow a limited amount of flexibility (which would almost certainly be needed).



So I was ready to attach the face plate to Neil's helmet. I then suddenly thought "what if this does not work?". After all while this new way seemed more accurate it could well be that that the end result is still off due to other reasons. I wondered it would have been better to see if a fix could be made to Buzz's helmet before then proceeding with a "known workable method" on Neil's helmet. It might mean possibly only having to remake one entire helmet, whereas proceeding with Neil's first might mean having to remake 2, or possibly more even more, helmets.

Rather to my surprise, without any further thinking or consideration I found myself using my scalpel and cutting out the rim part and top semicircle of the face plate of Buzz's helmet!



A stiffening template was cut



A new upper semicircle part for the face plate made and rim part attached and the template added



The new part looks good



so is joined onto the face plate



Lastly the top curve of the face plate (ie rim part) is joined to the body of the helmet. I really take my time with this but it "feels" good as I am doing it. The two parts seem to match and the template is really helping keep things stable and "on track" so to speak.



As you can see the amended helmet is a vast improvement and being honest is better than I hoped for. It is probably as good as could have done from the very start. My hope is the visor can be made accurately enough that there is just enough small flexibility in it that it will join properly to the helmet. However not at that stage yet.

Regards

Kevin

[Vermin_King]

Funny thing about plugging along. Fortune sometimes changes, which you would never have known had you thrown up your hands in surrender.

Nice work

[rifleman]

your doing a grand job hang in there chap you got this far keep going